I visited Coney Island on a quiet day last week. The shops were just opening and the usual crowd hasn't come in yet. I brought three different cameras with me, one of them was a Vivitar Ultra Wide & Slim, a point and shoot camera, courtesy of Mike Connealy. Mike has a review of this camera on his blog.The camera's simple 22mm wide angle lens has fantastic depth of field.

Sunday, June 7, 2009

"Sonata for our Heroes" a photographic group show in tribute to the unsung Filipino veterans of World War II at the Philippine Center, 5th Ave. New York City on June 7-19, 2009.The exhibit featured works by members of Sinag/American Society of Philippine Photographers of Metro New York; FotoSeven, California; Camera Club of the Philippines; Rick Rocamora and Jeryc Garcia.Poster design by Eddie Belen.

Friday, June 5, 2009

I have four former Soviet Union cameras, a Fed 1g, two Fed 2 and a Zorki 4.The Fed-1g is a Barnack style copy of the Leica IID made around 1954 in Kharkov, Ukraine. My camera came with a collapsible Elmar copied Fed50, a Tessar formula 50mm f3.5 lens. The camera is slightly smaller than the Leica II but not as elegantly finished and with a rather small rangefinder for focusing and separate viewfinder for composing, nevertheless, it is a fun camera to use. This model unfortunately doesn't have neck strap lugs so I attached a wrist strap on the tripod mount underneath so it will be easy to carry around.

Fed 1g sample shots:Rocks Water & Sky

Closter Pond

The Mailbox

Fed 2E with Jupiter-12 35mm f2.8 lens and finder

The Fed 2 is an upgrade of the Fed 1 made in 1955-1970. It has a combined viewfinder and rangefinder with a wide base. My Fed 2s came with an Industar 26M and Industar 61LD 50 mm lenses. Later I bought a Jupiter 12, 35mm f2.8 lens and a Jupiter 9, 85mm f2 lens for them.

Fed 2 sample shots:A Bronx Street

Three Wheeler

Roots

Zorki 4 with Jupiter 8, 50 mm f2 lens

The Zorki 4 is made in KMZ, Krasnogorsk (Moscow), Russia in 1956-1973.It has a bigger and brighter combined viewfinder and rangefinder than the Fed 1 and Fed 2. It also comes with complete slow and fast shutter speeds that goes up to 1/1000 of a second.While these Soviet cameras are not as refine as the Japanese and German rangefinders, they are tough and rugged cameras. I should use them more often but lately they had taken a back seat in favor of my other cameras. The lenses I got for them are very sharp however and all are being used more often with my Canon P and Leica IIF.